Dreaming of a White Christmas
by putters1
Summary: A Buffy Christmas Carol. Buffy is taken by the ghost of her mother to an alternate reality where something is shockingly different.
1. Chapter 1

"It's cold out," came Dawn's voice between her winter snuffles. "Maybe it'll snow later."

"Maybe," Willow said, although her doubtful tone suggested she thought otherwise. In the last few months at the Academy of Slayers - the schooling system that the gang had established for all those young and willing Slayers out there - everything was thriving. To Buffy, this meant a lot, especially considering how things had slipped from bad to worse of late: just six months ago, not only did she find out that over one hundred originally dormant Hellmouths buried under the earth had been activated, but they had been activated on the first anniversary of Sunnydale's fall and the rise of the Slayers. After putting two and two together, she realised she had only herself to blame. The world was now threatened. Demons were rioting and it was all her fault, because it was her idea to tamper with magicks they knew nothing about. But now that the Slayers knew, the revelation to them had had a roundabout effect to what she had expected. Who ever thought that teenage girls would rally together and think about the good of the world instead of themselves? Her faith in humanity had been restored. Or perhaps it was just the holiday spirit that made them like this…

Xander and Anne, his new friend of whom whether he was dating or not was yet to be determined by the gang, had just arrived to wish everybody a merry Christmas and happy Hannukah.

"We brought food," he piped up. "Food and presents. Lots of presents."

He emptied the gifts onto Buffy's coffee table while Willow quickly snatched up her laptop before the mound piled onto it.

"Xander, you didn't have to," said Buffy rather unnecessarily. With Giles in earshot, though, it seemed appropriate to be concerned about money. Even now, after all this time, she was trying to appease him. Must be old habit.

"Ah, it's no big deal. 'Tis the season to be jolly. Give and receive and whatnot," he grinned. Dawn wandered over from the window, allowing the drapes to fall back and cloak the room in artificial light again.

"Can I open mine now?" she asked.

"You may not," replied Buffy sternly. She smiled when Dawn slumped down impatiently. "You know you were like this when you were six, right?"

"Yeah, and I'm okay with it."

Kennedy came in from the kitchen soon after, bottles of wine in her grasp. "So, we up for alcohol yet?"

"I wouldn't say no," drooled Xander.

By the end of the evening, everybody was full to the brim with food and drink. They had nattered incessantly for hours, played a board game and fallen exhausted onto the couches. Everybody gradually drifted into Christmas sleep. Dreams of Santa Clause, dreams of reindeer, dreams of the aforementioned giving and receiving. Everything one should dream about on Christmas Eve.

But Buffy couldn't sleep. She was not sure why, she just couldn't. Maybe a little reading will send her off to the land of nod.

Buffy tiptoed out of the silent lounge, creaked open the oak door and slid out into the hallway. As she wandered down the corridors, she felt an odd warmth. Odd because of this time of year. And it wasn't just the warm feeling of a duvet plunging into her sides, or a fire wrapping its warmth around her. It was a feeling of belonging, family and like she was not alone and never would be again.

Outside, she saw frost draped on the trees, roofs, car windows, every crevice possible. It was a separate world. Suddenly a blinding light shone in Buffy's eyes just feet away from her in the hallway.

"Who's there?" she called. Though it was clearly a paranormal light, she knew it wasn't a ghoul or a demon. It felt safe, like she should go towards it.

"Buffy?" arrived a familiar, soothing voice. Buffy repeated herself, demanding an answer. And at that precise moment, her answer was granted.

"Mom?"


	2. Chapter 2

Joyce came out of the light.

"I want you to come with me, Buffy." She was almost angelic when she spoke. And this was really her! Buffy knew it. Not some hallucination or evil entity wearing her mask - this was really her mother from the beyond.

"Wh- where?" she uttered without even thinking what she was saying.

"I want to show you something. Please, come with me."

Buffy walked towards her.

"Is it really you?" Tears glistened in her eyes, wishing to dry Buffy's throat as she said the words.

"It's me, sweetie. You must come now, before it's too late."

Her arm outstretched, she clasped her mother's hand and gasped as she felt her stomach whirl.

Blackness. "Where are we?" Buffy had no idea whether she had actually spoken or not. She was nowhere in an atemporal space, blind and in-between two worlds. Then she wasn't. She was home again. Not in the Academy, but in the familiar streets of Sunnydale: the coastal California town of whitewashed houses and Abercrombie and Fisch pedestrians, known for its killer chilli dogs and high mortality rate. And, oh yeah, the fact that it caved in on itself eighteen months ago! Now there it was again. Identical. Buffy appeared in the High Street, confused and bewildered. People dressed in coats, scarves and woolly hats busily rushed along the sidewalks and aimed to retrieve those final Christmas presents they had left till the last minute. It was chilly and Buffy wasn't dressed for the weather. She looked out of place as she sauntered down the middle of the road and took in the experience. Was this really her hometown? There was the Magic Box! And it was intact! What on earth is going on?

"How is this possible?" Buffy asked, sensing her mother right behind her.

"Anything's possible," was the misty reply. They looked at each other and shared a mutual understanding of where to go next.

After a short walk from the center of town, they came and stood outside 1630 Revello Drive. Nothing had changed, but now she didn't feel like belonged there.

"This is another reality," Buffy whispered, the cold biting at her teeth as she spoke.  
"It is," said Joyce. A flash of a smile, and Joyce suddenly looked at her daughter with concern. "Honey, you should get inside before you freeze."

Buffy obeyed and walked up the same steps to the same front door. She felt like she should knock, as if someone else lived there, as if she were revisiting her childhood home. She lifted her hand to open the door, but it quickly swung open. At the threshold stood Robin, her former boss and current confidant. This made it even more awkward when his greeting was the last thing she had anticipated: a kiss on the lips. She pulled back as soon as she could.

"Hey," he muttered lovingly, "what are you doing outside?"

"Uh…"

"Did you finally close the Magic Box?" he asked, raising his eyebrows at how spacey she seemed.  
Silence. "Yes."

"Are you okay?"

"Fine. You? A-are you okay?" He nodded and she stepped back inside her house. It was the same, but different, like she had stepped into an old photo album. This reality wasn't in the past, however.

As Wood smiled off his "girlfriend's" strangeness, Buffy slowly inched to the dining room where she bumped into a rushing Xander. Again, she was filled with shock: his hair was shorter, he looked healthier, but the thing that surprised Buffy the most was his lack of eye patch. Those two big brown eyes were there again and made her feel whole, secure and safe.

"Hey there, Buff. Er, try not to run into Will and An. Things are getting messy with the food-preparing."

"Yeah. O-okay." He departed to the living room. Before Buffy could get another step, Willow immediately strolled out from the kitchen.

"You're back! We were getting worried."

"I'm fine," she replied.

"Really? You look frazzled," soothed the witch's voice, full of concern. Just like the Willow she knew.

"It's cold out," said Buffy.

"Maybe it'll snow later," came familiar words as Willow ran up the stairs. Joyce observed Buffy carefully and noted how intense she was.

"You haven't seen anything yet," she warned.

At that moment, there was a clatter of pans in the kitchen. Muffled voices sprang from the noise.

"Okay, frankly, I think it's preposterous that you'd even think of putting those there. This is all your fault!"

"Um, I wasn't even helping you…"

"Exactly. Layabout woman. Now shoo! This chicken is starting to resemble a caricature of a real chicken."

"I-I could help you with that if you just -"

"If I just what?!"

"Maybe you should lie down and let someone else do it."

"Oh, well, missy! I believe that's your job!"

Buffy entered the kitchen. Her heart raced to her throat; her stomach dipped, just as it did before. There, standing behind an array of vegetables on the counters (and saucepans on the floor), were Anya and Tara.

"Oh, hi, Buffy," exclaimed a cheery Anya. "Are you here to not help too?"


	3. Chapter 3

"Buffy, what's wrong?" asked Tara.

"She looks ill," Anya bluntly stated.

"No, guys, I-I'm fine. I just - I need space." She fled through the back door and clasped the fence on the porch. This was too spooky, too surreal. She should go, leave before there are any other surprises.

"I don't want you to leave yet," said Joyce behind her, as if she heard her thoughts. "This is too important."

"What is? What is this? Why have you brought me here?" she questioned.

"I can't answer you right now. But please, Buffy, please promise me you'll go back inside the house and stay safe. I know this is hard, but please say you'll try to adjust."

"Where are you going?" Buffy's voice was pleading and childish, but before her mother could answer, the back door opened and she was gone. Willow, Xander, Tara, Anya and Wood gazed at her warily.

"Are you sure you're okay?" Whose voice it was hadn't processed with her, but she found herself answering as reassuringly as possible. These weren't, after all, strangers.

Or were they? How much did she know or not know about these alternate versions of her friends? How different are they? Why are Tara and Anya alive again, Xander's eye in the place it should be? The principal smooching?! Half an hour later, any plausible conclusion was getting more and more distant and fuzzy.

"Um, where's Dawn?" Buffy asked Willow as they sat in the living room together. Her friend gave her a puzzled look.

"In her house, I guess."

"What?! Dawn's got her own house?" Before Buffy could suppress her astonishment, Willow's expression worsened. Then came the dreaded, pitying words:

"Er, Buffy, do you want me to make you some tea? Sugar-free tea?"

And so Buffy retired to her old bedroom, the place she always felt at home. She was fed up with the shifty looks from her friends and the patronizing suggestions that she takes a nap. As she lied on her bed, she tumbled questions over and over in her mind. The door opened and shed light on her. Willow carried a mug of tea over to her.  
"Hey," she said, "brought you some tea."

"Thanks."

"So… are you gonna tell me what's going on?"

'How about you tell me what's going on', Buffy thought. She found she couldn't connect with Willow like this. Despite looking like her, sounding like her, even smelling like her… this wasn't the Willow she knew. Buffy fobbed her off, claimed she was sick and needed rest. However, after an hour of restlessness and pacing around her room, she sprang forth when the doorbell rang and the faraway sound of Anya yelling "Dawn's here!" could be heard.

Through the door, across the landing, down the stairs, Buffy rushed. But to her surprise, Dawn wasn't there. Standing in a girlish coat, jeans and horn rimmed glasses, was an auburn-haired girl of about eighteen.

"Hi Buffy," said the girl, her voice unlike her sister's in every way, "I brought you presents. Half Christmas presents, the other half thanks-for-saving-my-life presents."

Buffy forged a smile as she took the gifts. What the hell was going on?

"You feeling better now? Willow said you were sick," came Robin's annoying romanticism. He curled his arms around her waist in a hug. Buffy just wished he would stop!  
"Principal Wood, I-I had no idea!" yelped the impostor. Robin slid his arms to his sides again to Buffy's relief.

"Miss Bishop. I hope you've had a good Christmas so far," he said quite bashfully.

As Robin continued to talk to "Dawn", Joyce appeared at Buffy's side.

"It's okay, they can't see me. Or us talking together. Christmas Carol or what, huh?" her mother jollied jokingly.

"Please. Tell me now." This was no joke anymore. Buffy's eyes were glazed; there was a silent panic in her voice. "What is going on, mom?"

"I want to offer this world to you. In place of yours." Off Buffy's puzzled look, she added, "this is a better world. You deserve that!"

"Where am I?!"

"This," gulped Joyce, pausing for a distressed moment, "this is your life - if Dawn had never been apart of it. If she had never been created."


	4. Chapter 4

"No." The statement was final and decisive, even though it was whispered through doubtful lips.

"I know you probably don't believe me -"

"I can't…"

Buffy walked into the living room and slipped gently onto the couch. Her hands were wrapped in fists; a tear trickled down her nose. Her friends were oblivious to this, as if Joyce had taken Buffy out of the equation again.

"I know in your heart you know this is true." The words were spoken as if from another person. Her mother wouldn't show her this world. Yes, thousands of times she pondered what it would be like if Dawn hadn't been conjured by those monks. Before it happened and after, but she never imagined it would go like this.

"Dawn wasn't the reason. For any of this," she muttered at last.

"I'm sorry. I really am. But she was."

Then, Buffy started to breathe heavier. Her eyes widened, her body heated like a furnace. It started to fit into place, like a jigsaw puzzle from Hell: had Buffy not sacrificed herself for her sister, no powerful resurrection magic would have tampered with the Slayer line. No final war, no First Evil, no destruction of Sunnydale, and Anya… still alive.

"I can't believe this!"

"You must, honey! Try, for me."

Had Buffy not died and suffered post-traumatic stress, she would have stopped the nerd Troika with her clear head before it was too late. And she clearly did here. Tara… still alive.

"This is - this is too much!"

Had there been no Apocalypse because of Dawn, Xander and Anya would have taken things slowly, just as planned. Here they were now, together and happy. She watched as Xander and Tara fondled Anya's stomach as her baby kicked for the first time.

"No!"

Had she not had to deal with the stress, she wouldn't have slept with Spike in the first place. Robin would have come to town to find her, he would have avenged Spike in cold blood, and neither of them would have cared...

"You deserve this! You deserve so much better after everything you've been through!"

"This isn't about me, mom," Buffy whimpered through tears of disbelief.

"It is! You have given yourself, your life, to the people who love you, even the people who don't know you," Joyce said, her voice broke as much as her heart when she spoke. "You have saved the world again and again, and for what? For once, all I'm asking is that you do something good for you."

"Mom, don't do this!"

Everybody came into the living room and huddled around the crackling fireplace. Buffy and Joyce watched unseen as Xander went to the window and looked out into the cold, dark street.

"Hey, everybody," he beckoned, waving his arm for them to join him, "it's snowing!" Buffy dodged as they stampeded to the window. The snow fell from the blackness and purified the beautiful world.

"You can live a better life," said Joyce, "evil may still be around, but it always will be. This is the safest place."

It appeared her friends could see her again. Tara glanced over to see Buffy upset, but her strangeness tonight was automatically excused. Things always got emotional round the holidays anyway.

"Buffy," called Tara, "isn't it wonderful?"

Going over to join them, she felt normal again. Was this really how it went? How it was supposed to go? What does it mean to question how something is supposed to go? Looking up into the starry sky, Buffy wondered whether this was her fated life... And it just went wrong.

"I can't wait for tomorrow," Anya yelped with happiness.

"We'll have to get our sled out," Xander suggested.

"You mean your sled?"

"As in I made it, yeah. And hey, it'll come in handy when the baby comes!"

There were smiles as they recoiled back around the fireplace and flicked on the TV. Buffy couldn't help but join in as if this were real. She almost forgot about the ghost of her mother next to her.

"Such a small price to pay," she said. "Tomorrow, you'll wake up in your bedroom. Your girlfriends will rush into your room, bringing your presents. Anya will burn the turkey; Tara and Willow will end up using their spells to make it all better. You and this young man, Robin, will curl up in an armchair, and by the end of the day, you'll be singing carols and you'll laugh and be happy. This is all possible!"

Buffy glanced at her friends. Even now, they were laughing and joking.

"But instead, tomorrow, you'll wake up in that school. You won't have time to open your presents because Mr. Giles will want you to train young girls how to fight each other. Willow and Xander will think, as they do every day, about Anya and Tara, and emotions will run high, and they'll cry in each other's arms. You'll cry, only by yourself, because you'll wish you didn't feel so alone at Christmas time."

Even now, Buffy's tears were reforming and trickling down her face.

"You have to see that this is the right choice, Buffy!" The anxiety in her mother's voice was intense and passionate. Fleeting moments passed as her daughter observed the almost cliché Christmas scene. Everything was so colourful and bright and contrasted to the darkness of the Academy as she had left it.

"But it isn't the right choice," Buffy strained at last.

"How can you say -" started her mother.

"Because of Dawn. I don't know much about destiny, ironically. Or if there are right or wrong paths. But I know this choice is wrong."

"How is it wrong? What is so wrong about taking back what is owed to you?" Joyce was almost wailing now. It was desperate, but Buffy could relate to it. It was motherly.

"Tara and Anya died. They were done, even if it was before their time" she mumbled through tears, "and Dawn didn't die. And I'm not going to deny her existence for what is only good for me."

"But Buffy…" Joyce's eyes pleaded for her to choose what she thought would be right.

"I'm sorry, mom."

"I can't watch you do this, I can't watch you go back to that place! Dawn is not your sister! She ruined your life."

"No," Buffy replied, "she made it. Maybe not for the best… but she made me who I am."

For what felt like minutes, they stood there looking into each other's eyes. Joyce didn't want this made official, and Buffy did. There was a friction between them, but it was made out of love.

"I'm so, so sorry, mom."

"I just wanted you to be happy…"

"I am."

Over her shoulder, she saw the old gang together, still joking, still laughing, still talking.

"Take me back." Buffy ordered. Joyce took her in her arms and embraced her as they both wept. And there she was in the Academy again. Stillness, darkness, but warmth. Her mother was gone, and so was the happiness. She tiptoed around her friends and watched as they slept. Dawn lay on the chair by the window. Buffy smiled, knowing she had awaited the snow to fall for most of the night. Buffy gently brushed her hand against Dawn's hair and smiled.

"What are you doing?" mumbled Dawn as her eyes gradually opened.

"Nothing. Just go back to sleep." Dawn heaved herself up to look out of the window. Together, they looked up to the sky and waited for the snow to fall.

When it didn't come, and as the wind howled at trees, there was still a satisfaction Buffy felt that she couldn't begin to describe.


End file.
